Quote:
Originally Posted by CWatkinsNash
No, in most cases it's simply a matter of the labor involved to add them to the collection instead of selling them. A lot of libraries don't have the shelf space to accommodate many donations, so they would have to be sorted by hand, inspected, and then those that pass have to be prepared... It's a lot of work, and work is money spent, whereas sold books are money that can be turned into library resources and new books that are already deemed suitable to add to the collection.
Some libraries have just stopped accepting donations altogether because they simply can't accommodate them - instead they often refer donators to their local Friends of the Library, which usually is responsible for fund raising, including book sales. And some libraries still have to deal with people dropping off boxes of books in the middle of the night like reverse thieves.
While there may be some great, worthy books in some donation piles, the majority of them just are not and it simply isn't worth the time and trouble to deal with them. (I recall one librarian's tale of a man who insisted that the hundreds of outdated tech manuals he wanted to donate just HAD to be made available in the library.)
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Many libraries are now in a situation where they need money more than books. Their mission has changed over the years. Many libraries have become as much of a community outreach center as a quiet place to read books.
I would suggest that part of this is that books are much more common now than they were even 60 years ago. To give an example, To Kill A Mockingbird was written in 1960 and was the #3 best seller from that year. The initial run was 5000 books, of which they expected to sell between 2 to 4 thousand. Many of the initial run were sold to libraries. One sees all sorts of estimates of how many copies it sold it's first year, but estimates at the time were around 200,000 copies, plus book club sales. Now, best sellers have print runs in the millions.